There are many aspects of the grace of God that delight the heart of the believer whether viewed in relation to the saints of this dispensation or to those that are past. God's dealings with Enoch, with Noah, with Abraham and with David, and with the saints of their days, manifested the grace of God, even if in government God was testing man after the flesh to show that it was impossible for man to receive divine blessing by his own efforts. Even when Israel accepted the yoke of the law, God's grace was manifested, for all must have perished at the foot of Sinai after worshipping the golden calf, if God had not spared them in His grace. Thereafter, the sacrificial system was the proof that Israel was not under pure law, for grace provided a sacrifice for sins of ignorance.
In all the Gospels we see grace manifested in the Person of Jesus, but it is in John that it is written, "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us (and we beheld His glory as of the only begotten of the Father), full of grace and truth … and of His fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ" (John 1:14-17). God was fully revealed in Jesus, not demanding righteousness which man could never produce, but offering blessing to all who believed in His well-beloved Son. Of the divine fulness that was in the Son, the apostles, and those who received their testimony, received the rich blessings that never could have been procured on the ground of law.
When the Son spoke, men well might wonder at "the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth," for they were not the legal demands of Sinai, but the glad tidings of healing, deliverance and liberty in "the acceptable year of the Lord." At Sychar's well we learn something of the wonders of divine grace that revealed to a poor sinner the desire of the Father to have worshippers who would worship Him in spirit and in truth. Only grace, thus manifested in the Son, could procure the worshippers; and they were to be of such as the Lord found that day; sinners exposed by the light in which God was revealed, but who, in faith, confessed that Jesus was the Christ.
In John 8, when the scribes and Pharisees bring to the Lord the poor woman taken in sin, the grace of God shines out. The Son of God allows the full sanction of the law, but calls for one among the accusers, who was without sin, to be the executor of the sentence of the law. He, the only One without sin, had not come to "judge the world, but to save the world," so said to the woman, "Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more." He had come to write with the finger of humanity on the dust of this world the wondrous message of the grace of God.
Wherever we follow the blessed Lord, whether in John's Gospel, or in the other Gospels, it is the same story that we hear from His lips, or learn from His works of power: all is in grace. If there was once a curse on His lips, it was for a tree that bore no fruit; not for any son of Adam, though He rebuked the hypocrisy of the scribes and Pharisees: yet, in Luke 13, where the fig tree bears no fruit, there is the plea to spare it for another year. And on the cross, where the heart of man in all its wickedness was exposed, the grace of God shines out in all its brilliance, where Jesus says to the poor repentant thief, "Today shalt thou be with me in paradise," and where He cries, "Father forgive them for they know not what they do."
How richly is divine grace found in Him of whom the Spirit of God writes by Paul, "For ye know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that, though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that ye through His poverty might be rich" (2 Cor. 8:9). Not only did the Son of God empty Himself of the form of God, but He relinquished all that belonged to Him as Son of David, and having given up all He possessed, He gave Himself for us.
Both Paul and Peter speak of our standing in grace before God, the former saying in Roman 5:2, "By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand." God has not only cleared us of every charge of guilt, but has brought us into His favour, and this is not because of anything that we have done, but because of His own sovereign love; and faith has appropriated this wondrous blessing. Israel stood before God on the ground of law; the Christian's standing is in divine grace. Israel's blessing depended on what they could do: ours rests on what Christ has done. Every blessing that God has given us is on account of His unmerited favour, and has been procured for us by the shedding of the precious blood of Jesus.
The Apostle Peter, in his First Epistle, writes of many of the blessings given to us of God. We are elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, and through faith our souls are saved, "of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you." All that we are as "a chosen generation, a royal priest-hood, an holy nation," and as "a spiritual house, an holy priesthood." we owe to Him, "Who His own self bare our sins in His own body on the tree." These, and all the other blessings and privileges spoken of by the apostle are summed up in 1 Peter 5:12, "This is the true grace of God wherein ye stand." Nothing can take from us this standing in grace, all is God's gift to us in Christ; and all the resources that abide in Christ are available to us so that we might walk in the light and power of God's grace to us, for we have been set apart by the Holy Spirit "unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ." Nothing else than the holy life of perfect obedience of Jesus has God given to us as a pattern for our walk through this world, and the measure in which we follow His steps will manifest the measure in which we have consciously entered into our standing in grace before God.
God has called us to glory, but our way lies through a wilderness where there is nothing to sustain the divine life that He has given us. All our resources are in Christ in heaven, and are brought to us to maintain us for God's pleasure here. Israel received manna daily from God, and we have the Bread of God to feed upon, not only to supply the strength needed for the journey, but also to rejoice the heart as we feed upon the love and grace made known in Jesus, both in His life and in His death upon the cross.
For the trials of the wilderness we have "a merciful and faithful High Priest … (who) is able to succour them that are tempted"; and the throne of grace is available to us, upon which Jesus sits, so that we can come boldly to it to "obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need"; (Heb. 2:18; Heb. 4:16). What comfort there is for us to know that Jesus has passed the way before us, and has a heart that feels with us in all our sorrows, and has strength to support us in all our weakness. Our names are written upon His breast of love, and upon His shoulders of strength. Moreover, He will bring us safely through the desert, for "He is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by Him, seeing that He ever liveth to make intercession for them" (Heb. 7:25).
In passing through the wilderness we can also enter the immediate presence of God as worshippers; our feet on the sands of the desert, but our spirits in heaven. It is indeed wondrous grace that enables us to come with boldness into the holiest in company with our Great Priest, knowing that God desires to have us there, and that He has given us the fitness for His presence through the blood of Jesus. As Minister of the Sanctuary the Lord Jesus watches over God's people, feeding them with the showbread, and maintaining the light on the pure candlestick. There is also the prospect of the world to come to cheer us on our way; it is a hope that is "sure and stedfast," and that enters within the veil of heaven into which Jesus has entered for us as forerunner. In spirit we are already brought to that which we shall enjoy in the world to come, for we "have come to Mount Zion," the hill of grace.
The greater the sense of our weakness, the more likely are we to be cast upon the Lord and His resources in our service for Him. When Paul had received the most wonderful revelations, on being caught up to the third heavens, he also received "a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan" to buffet him, and to make him conscious of his own weakness in serving the Lord. At first, the apostle felt his weakness would be a great hindrance in his service, but on crying to the Lord, His reply was, "My grace is sufficient for thee; for my strength is made perfect in weakness" (2 Cor. 12:9).
Paul knew something of the grace of Christ, both in its manifestation in His becoming poor (2 Cor. 8:9); and as the unspeakable gift of God (2 Cor. 9:15); but he learned it in a new way in the details of his service for his blessed Master. When he thought of the immensity of the privilege given to him in this service he wrote, "If ye have heard of the dispensation of the grace of God which is given me to you-ward: … Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ" (Eph. 3:2, 8).
The apostle was certainly a special vessel, with a special mission, but each servant of the Lord can count upon the same resources of grace in Christ to carry out whatever the Lord has given him to do. It is still true what the Lord said to His disciples, "Without me, ye can do nothing"; but it is also true, even as Paul found in his service, "I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me" (Phil. 4:13).
There are special gifts given from the ascended Christ, and these are enumerated in Ephesians 4:11, and among these the Apostle Paul had a peculiar ministry as minister of the Gospel, and minister of the mystery. But, says the Scripture, "unto every one of us is given grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ" (Eph. 4:7), and this grace is for every saint of God, to carry out whatever he is to be or do for Christ in every detail of life. We need divine grace to live for Christ, to represent Him aright in all our words and ways.
In the 29th verse of this same chapter it is written, "Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers." Grace is needed to convey anything of Christ to each other, whether it be in word or action. The word that edifies proceeds from the heart that has been enriched by the grace supplied in communion with the Lord Jesus. Each has a spiritual capacity of grace that is sustained in divine communion.
Second Timothy contemplates the difficulties that the saints have to meet "in the last days," when "men shall be lovers of their own selves … lovers of pleasures rather than lovers of God; having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof." In the midst of all the "perilous times," the man of God is to be "strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus" (2 Tim. 2:1). This is the divine safeguard to sustain him amidst a worthless profession, where the mere Christian professor is little different morally from the heathen.
In the first chapter of this epistle we read that God "hath saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began" (verse 9). This divine grace that is in Christ Jesus directs our thoughts to God's eternal purpose; and amidst all the unreality of the last days it is establishing to know that nothing can fail of all that God has purposed for His own glory and the honour of His dear Son. So that the grace that is in Christ Jesus links us with what is eternal and stable, and which cannot be affected by the ruin of the testimony committed to man in responsibility. If we are strong in this grace, the eternal grace of God in Christ, we shall not be moved by human failure, though we shall not be insensible to it.
If the Apostle John unfolds the manifestation of grace in the Son of God incarnate, the Apostle Peter writes of the hope that God has given to us, of "the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 1:13). It is grace at the beginning, grace in its manifold features all the way until the end, and when the blessed end is reached it is still grace. God is not bringing us into blessing because of anything we have done, but because of His great love wherewith He has loved us. We owe everything to God and His grace, and to the work accomplished by the Son of God upon the cross.
But Paul joins with Peter to tell of the marvellous grace that awaits us, writing to the Ephesians, "That in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus" (Eph. 2:7). How the grace of God exceeds in its surpassing riches in bringing those who once were sinners into glory with His own Son! God has taken us out of all our moral degradation, as dead in trespasses and sins, has quickened us in His own life, and given us to sit in Christ in the heavenlies in view of displaying to the universe, in the coming ages, the exceeding richness of His grace. He has not given this place to angels, or to good men, but to those who were sinners, and whom He has so enriched in His kindness.
When David said, "Is there yet any left of the house of Saul, that I may show him kindness for Jonathan's sake" (2 Sam. 9:1, 3), he was illustrating the kindness that God shows to those who are, by nature, at enmity with Him. The covenant that David had made with Jonathan (1 Sam. 20:14-15) was the reason for his words and action: but guilty sinners had no claim on the kindness of God. In His sovereign love, God has taken up such guilty sinners as Saul of Tarsus, and you and me, and has given us the blessings of sonship and heirship in association with His own Son, to show to the universe what His kindness is.